84: National Language

Explain xkcd: It's 'cause you're dumb.
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National Language
She's pretty sharp when provoked.
Title text: She's pretty sharp when provoked.

Explanation

A group of people is waiting for the bus, or are standing in a queue, or whatever. One man is complaining about immigrants unwilling to learn English, the "language of the land". A woman has overheard his "speech" and makes a remark in Cherokee. I could not find a first rate source for Cherokee language, but a web search suggests the phrase "osio Sarah dawado" translates to "Hello, I am Sarah", which is of little interest for the conversation. The real message is that English itself is an immigrated language; other languages were spoken in America before English speaking settlers arrived. Although Cherokee seems to be a relatively young culture [1], it is much more native to America than any European culture. Some Indian culture reach back milleniums. So the man complaining about immigrants not willing to adapt the local language is basically one himself.

Transcript

This happened to my friend:

[Men and women are standing in a row]

Man: English should be the national language. These immigrants should have to learn English when they come here.

Woman: Yeah

Man: When you go to live somewhere, you learn the language they speak there. English is the language of the land.

Other Woman: Excuse me, but osio Sarah dawado.

Man: What the hell was that?

Other Woman: Woman: Cherokee.

Trivia

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Discussion

Any idea what she's saying? 76.122.5.96 08:37, 24 October 2012 (UTC)

Yes, she's introducing herself: "Hello, my name is Sarah". -- IronyChef (talk) 14:00, 24 October 2012 (UTC)

Is it worth noting that the United States does not actually have an official language, at States-wide level? The United Kingdom has English legislated for, while officially recognises various Celtic languages regionally (equivalent to that Cherokee example that may well be a state/sub-state official lingo?). India has English and Hindi on the relevent official national statutes (as well as many and varied other ones listed regionally, IIRC), so may technically demand English usage more so than the US itself.

(It is somewhat an urban legend that the US was just a hair's-breadth away from adopting German as its official language, but still fun to speculate how that might have affected its alliances for either World War, had it been linguistically more connected to the 'other side', and perhaps having a Special Relationship with the different European power thus affecting what side they'd officially support in 1914/1939.)

It's a convention, of course. But there are any number of communities that (many generations since the original settling event) still maintain their own non-Anglo/non-Native language, internally, as a majority tongue for the community. Albeit to various lesser or even effectively insignificant degrees in the grand scheme of things, compared to the national usage of English. (Somewhat mis-spelt English, of course. ;) 178.98.31.27 07:09, 24 June 2013 (UTC)

Indeed. Those who don't know me already tend to consider my English strange, if I visit the States. And that's without my deliberately invoking any pericombobulations or general contrafibularities...
Not that my accent and dialect are typical of the UK, either (we have a wide range of linguistic/vocal variation, as indeed most long-and-continuously inhabited places do), but most people are used and prepared to deal with even quite strong variations that are perhaps not so well known (or even comprehenisible) across the Pond. 172.71.94.209 21:03, 5 December 2022 (UTC)

I did this when my Human Geography teacher asked the class if English should be the United States' official language. Best moment of that class.173.22.5.38 04:40, 28 October 2013 (UTC)

I should really try this out sometime. 42.book.addict (talk) 22:49, 2 February 2024 (UTC)

That kind of illustrates the point, doesn't it? Either assimilate into the natives or beat them. Naturally, the natives would not be happy about the second option. 108.162.246.5 23:00, 27 January 2014 (UTC)

Yeah! Peepl what wanna go inta me cuntri shuld learn dat wat language we speak and how 2 speak it properlys! 17:37, 23 July 2015 (UTC)

Are you for real?

The official language of Belize is English, and only 42% speak it there. The rest speak Spanish like all the rest of the countries around them. Belize was settled by the English pirates rather than by the Spanish settlers.

starts speaking in p r o t o i n d o e u r o p e a n

South Africa has eleven official languages. All forms, correspondence etc. has to be made available in all eleven languages, by law. Although everyone speaks English to some degree. The Cat Lady (talk) 15:47, 11 August 2021 (UTC)